Accidental Recall
by mags1587
Summary: Howard Stark tried for years to find Steve Rogers, using every ounce of his genius and every bit of tech that he could imagine. When Tony and Bruce come across some of that tech, they end up finding someone else.
1. Chapter 1

_AN: Strictly movie-verse. Enjoy._  
_Disclaimer: The Avengers do not belong to me._

* * *

"Okay, that's enough," Bruce said, pushing away from the table and the equations that were refusing to make sense. He and Tony were trying to improve the sensors on the helicarrier, the jets, and Tony's suit to detect some of the more exotic energy signatures they had encountered recently. What should have been a straightforward project had hit a snag that stopped them cold.

"We're so close," Tony said, still staring at the monitor. Bruce knew that; it was part of what was so frustrating. They were stuck inches from a solution. "It's right there, Bruce. What if we-"

"Tony," Bruce interrupted, and Tony blinked at his sharp tone and looked at him. "We have been staring at this for hours. The numbers are not adding up and if we keep working I think I may move past annoyance into actual anger."

"Right, time for a break," Tony said, waving a hand and hiding all of the screens that contained the oh-so-frustrating numbers. "Much as I love the other guy, I'm the only one who gets to smash up my mansion."

Bruce quirked a smile. Tony constantly made quips like that, but there was never, not once, any trace of actual worry about the other guy or what he might do. He still thought Tony was a bit too cavalier about it all, but Bruce couldn't deny that he had grown to appreciate it. He watched Tony walk across the floor of his basement lab/garage of his Malibu mansion, going to a stack of boxes piled up against a wall. "What are you looking for?" Bruce asked as Tony started to open boxes.

"A distraction," Tony said. "These all belonged to my father. Every time I think I have found and sorted through all his stuff, someone finds another stack of boxes like this."

Bruce wandered over and started looking through boxes himself. Notes, files, old pieces of electronics... "Looks like it's all from one of his labs?" he guessed.

"Seems that way," Tony said. "An early one, I think." He pulled out a file and opened it. "Yep. This is all from Cap's era. He might actually recognize some of this."

"Hmm," Bruce said. He wondered if they could find something Steve actually used in the war. He poked through a few boxes, finding mostly files and pieces of half-finished electronics. Then he found something a little more interesting. "What's this?" he asked, pulling out a rectangular metal device with some dials and other readouts.

Tony grinned. "Let's find out," he said, leading the way back to a table and clearing a spot. Bruce set it down, and Tony produced a screwdriver to take off the casing and reveal the inner workings. From the few labels and by looking at the machine itself, they quickly determined it was some sort of tracking device. What they had was the base unit. The homing tags had to be somewhere in the boxes, but a quick search didn't turn them up; no notes or files on the tracking device turned up, either.

Back to staring at the box, Bruce poked at the wiring. "This is just..." he trailed off, trying to find the right words to describe the mess of wires.

"Overly complicated?" Tony suggested. "Yeah, dear old dad could go overboard sometimes. Seems like everything's in good shape, though, and hooked up to where it's supposed to be."

"How can you tell?"

"Years of practice," he said. "I have been looking at his designs my whole life. Used to correct them, too, until I learned it wasn't worth the grief." Bruce looked at Tony but kept his mouth shut. He knew better than to open the can of worms that was Tony's childhood. "This one is something else, though," Tony continued. "What do you think? Do we turn it on, try to find some of those tags?"

"Sure, why not? What's the worst that can happen?" Bruce stopped as soon as the words past his lips. "I shouldn't have said that."

"Nope, you've jinxed us," Tony said, grinning. "It's probably going to blow up on us now." Of course, that didn't stop Tony from flipping the switch. "Be ready to duck."

Bruce tensed and took a step back. The machine did nothing exciting, though, just hissed with static. Tony and Bruce leaned forward. "Maybe there is a loose wire," Tony said.

"Or it's just on the wrong frequency," Bruce said, twisting one of the dials slowly.

"The homing tags could all be destroyed or out of range," Tony said. The machine started chiming. "Or it was just on the wrong frequency."

Bruce frowned. A numeric readout on the machine was just spinning, instead of settling on a coordinate or unit of distance like they had thought it would. "Huh. Why do you think-" Bruce was cut off when his jinx finally came into play. A flash of light burst from the machine. Bruce and Tony dove to the ground, but it wasn't an explosion. It was worse.

A portal - smaller in size, but still shockingly similar to the one that had appeared in the sky over New York City - formed midway between Tony's floor and ceiling.

"Oh fuck," Tony said, but before either of them had time to do anything, a man fell through the portal, the base unit shorted out in an explosion of sparks, and the portal closed, leaving no evidence - besides the man on the floor - that it had ever appeared.

Bruce and Tony just stayed where they were for a few seconds. "Tony, I think your father used the tesseract to enhance his tracking device," Bruce said.

"Sure seems that way, doesn't it?" Tony said. "At least it didn't spit out aliens this time."

"Just because he looks human doesn't mean he isn't an alien," Bruce said, getting up and going over to the man who appeared to be unconscious. He had dark hair and was wearing a thick navy coat and brown pants and boots. Bruce checked his pulse, which seemed normal, and there were no other obvious injuries. He noticed a chain and tugged it out from beneath his shirt. "He's wearing dog tags," Bruce said. "James Barnes."

Tony frowned. "I know that name," he said. "JARVIS, why do I know that name?"

"There are a number of men named 'James Barnes' in the United States, three of whom are currently serving in the US military. What is the ID number on the tags, Dr. Banner?" Bruce read it off. An instant later, JARVIS continued. "That ID number matches the number issued for one Sergeant James 'Bucky' Barnes. He served with Captain Rogers in WWII and died during a mission."

"He fell off a train," Tony said, looking completely shocked. "He was Steve's best friend, there was a mission, and he fell out of train down a mountain before Steve could pull him back inside."

"That information corresponds with mine, sir."

Bruce stared at the man lying on the floor. This was impossible. Completely impossible. There was no way a man who had died 70 years ago was lying on Tony's floor. "Any chance we're hallucinating?" Bruce asked.

Tony didn't take his eyes off the man on the floor. "Both of us hallucinating about Steve's dead best friend, who you didn't even know about before just now? Uh, yeah, I think time travel's the more likely explanation."

"Crap," Bruce said. "We have to call someone."

"Do we really?" Tony asked. Bruce gave him a look and Tony sighed. "Yeah, okay. Steve? Wait, no, not until we're sure it's really Barnes."

"Fury?" Bruce suggested, even though he knew Fury would be, well, furious.

"Oh, hell no," Tony said.

"That leaves Clint and Natasha."

"Clint's less likely to kill us."

"Like he's not going to tell Natasha immediately," Bruce said, going to retrieve his cell phone. "Besides, neither one of them can kill us until they get here from LA."

"I, for one, would not bet against Natasha knowing how to kill someone over the phone."

"He's a master assassin too, Tony."

"Yes, but again, he's less likely to kill us."

Bruce rolled his eyes, but he did hit Clint's contact number instead of Natasha's. It was when the phone was ringing that Bruce froze. "Uh... what the hell do I say?"

"You're the one on the phone, you get to figure that out," Tony said. In response, Bruce put the phone on speaker and placed it on the table between them. Tony immediately protested. "Hey, no, what are you- You're the one who insisted on calling someone, you talk to him!"

"You're the one who turned on the machine," Bruce said.

"You're the one who changed the frequency," Tony returned. "And you're the one who jinxed us!"

"Did you two blow something up again?" Clint's amused voice came over the line; Bruce hadn't even heard him pick up.

"Clint! Hi! Um..." Bruce trailed off.

"Oh, crap," Clint said, sighing. "Tasha, Bruce and Tony blew up something and Bruce is at a loss for words, so it's probably bad."

"Is the mansion still standing, at least?" Natasha asked, and Bruce was apparently not the only one who had his phone on speaker.

Tony gave Bruce a dirty look, but Bruce just rolled his eyes, because really, he had told him that Clint would tell her right away.

"Okay, now you two are making me nervous," Clint said. "What the hell happened?"

Bruce again looked to Tony for help, but Tony just shrugged in a "I have no fucking clue what to tell them either" manner. Bruce glared at him. Tony just motioned at the phone, and okay, Tony was right. There was no good way to do this so best to just get it over with. And it probably would be better coming from Bruce. (And apparently he and Tony knew each other well enough to hold silent conversations with each other and when the hell had that happened - but there wasn't time to figure that out right now.)

Bruce took a deep breath. "Well, you see, it's like this..."


	2. Chapter 2

Clint had this fantastic rant all planned out in his head and ready to go when he got to Tony's house and was in the same room with the two idiots who, incidentally, were never going to do science unsupervised ever again. But when he walked into Tony's basement, he saw their "guest" awake and alert (though thankfully tied to a chair), and Clint just stopped and stared, because damn it this really wasn't some elaborate prank and he and Natasha really should have called Fury and what the hell had Tony and Bruce done?

"Clint Barton, meet James Barnes," Tony said. "You can call him Bucky."

"Nice to meet you," the man (who Clint was not going even think of as Barnes because that guy had been dead for 70 god-damned years) said. The imposter continued when Clint just stared at him. "So, uh, these guys tell me you're quite the marksman."

"Really?" Clint asked, leveling a glare at Bruce and Tony. "What else do they tell you?"

"Not much," he said, his lips quirked in amusement. "Just a little about Steve and your guys' team. By the way, Avengers? Weird name. What are you guys supposed to be avenging, anyway?"

"Oh, like Howling Commandos is such a great name," Tony said. "And that is all we told him. Nothing else. I swear."

Which of course meant they told this guy more, and seriously, for a couple of geniuses these two could be complete idiots.

"Right," the imposter said. "That was all. There was certainly nothing about an alien invasion in New York." Clint looked at him, and what the hell, was this guy was actually teasing Tony?

"Stop getting us into trouble," Tony hissed. The imposter Barnes just smirked, and Clint realized that yes, this guy was teasing Tony. He was actually enjoying himself.

Holy god in heaven, he was going to shoot all of them. "Okay, you, whoever you are," Clint said, pointing at the imposter who was absolutely not Barnes. "I really don't know what angle you're playing, but I am not in the mood." Barnes the imposter just nodded and kept his mouth shut. Clint turned to glare at Bruce and Tony. "As for you two..."

"In our defense, Clint, we're almost completely positive this is really Bucky Barnes," Bruce said.

"Also in our defense, he is still tied up, just like you said," Tony said.

Clint told himself Natasha would be very disappointed if he killed them without her and took a deep breath. "Can I speak to you two over there?" he said, pointing to the opposite end of the room.

"He'll still be able to hear us," Tony said. Clint glared at him and Tony took a step back. "I'm just saying! The acoustics down here are really good!"

The imposter Barnes made a sound of amusement and Clint turned to glare at him, then looked at him suspiciously. "You know, you're pretty calm for someone who just woke up 70 years in the future surrounded by strangers and tied to a chair."

The imposter didn't flinch. "Tony kind of looks like Howard and he tells the story of Steve getting his shield the same as Howard does. Plus, as weird as this is? Still much better than falling to my death, which is what I was doing before I landed here." Clint just stared at him, and admitted to himself that yes, that was all plausible, but it didn't matter because there was still no way this was really Barnes.

"Really, Clint, when we worked out what happened, it makes sense," Bruce said.

Clint looked at Bruce in disbelief. "How in the hell does a man who died seventy years ago suddenly appearing in Tony's basement make any sense?"

"Just hear us out," Bruce said. "We were taking a break from working on the sensors and started looking through some of Howard Stark's things. Tony just got these boxes and hadn't sorted through them yet. We found a tracking device Howard invented."

"And what, you two decided to start fooling around with something you didn't understand?" Clint asked, and fuck, he realized quickly that had been the wrong thing to say because now Tony and Bruce looked insulted.

"We understood it fine," Tony snapped. "It just worked a hell of a lot better than we thought it would."

"We didn't just find it and turn it on, Clint," Bruce said. "We looked at it, figured out it was a tracking device, and after determining it was in working order, decided to turn it on. There was no way of knowing that it had been enhanced using the tesseract."

"Okay, seriously, you two called me and told me that a guy fell through a portal onto your floor and that you think it's a guy who died 70 fucking years ago," Clint said. "Neither of you get to be pissed off at me right now."

Which of course didn't stop either Tony or Bruce from staring at him in annoyance, as if he was the one overreacting. And imposter Barnes looked amused as hell by the whole thing and damn it, no one should look that amused while tied to a chair.

Clint was definitely shooting them all.

"Do you want to yell at us or do you want us to tell you what we figured out?" Tony asked, his arms folded across his chest.

Clint supposed he should figure out what they knew first. He still had some time before Natasha got here with Steve, anyway. "Fine. What have you figured out?"

"Howard Stark invented this tracking device during the war," Bruce said. "He gave one of the homing tags to Steve for testing purposes. Steve gave it to Bucky."

"Why?"

The imposter answered. "Because Howard was always inventing something and he was always giving it to Steve to test. Steve could care less about most of the junk Howard invented and didn't want to deal with it, so he'd pass whatever the latest invention was onto me or one of the other guys. I got the homing tag."

And okay, yes, that did sound like Steve, but it still didn't mean anything.

"Right, okay, so Bucky had the tag," Tony said. "He also fiddled with it and inadvertently changed the frequency. Which is important, because see, my father thought Steve had it and that it was set to a specific frequency. So when Steve went down in the ice, he tried to use this to find him."

"Howard did everything he could think of to try and boost the range of the tracking device," Bruce continued. "Even going so far as to use Hydra weapons or maybe even the tesseract itself to power it. Only Howard was only looking for that one frequency, so he never found anything."

"How do you know he only looked for that one frequency?" Clint asked.

"Okay, fine, if you want to get technical, he might have searched for other frequencies, but he didn't search for the frequency the tag was set to," Tony said. "Because if he had, it would have done what it did today after I started it up and Bruce hit on the right frequency. Which was that it found Bucky and deposited him onto my floor."

"Okay, see, this is where you lose me," he said. "Because I can see this thing still working after 70 years. I can even maybe go along with it creating a portal to wherever the homing tag was, because hey, the tesseract's been known to create portals. What I cannot believe is that this thing found the tag 70 years ago and brought the guy carrying it here!"

"It makes sense," Bruce said. Clint looked at him incredulously and Bruce continued. "We know the tesseract can be used to create portals from one point in space to another. It's not that much of a stretch to assume it can create portals between points in space and time."

"Yes, it is!"

"No, it's not," Tony said. "From a certain perspective it actually makes more sense that it goes across time than if it didn't."

Clint was not going to let Tony elaborate on that perspective. Ever. "Even if it could create a portal in time, why would it? Why not just find the homing tag now instead of very conveniently right before Barnes died?"

"Because that's the last time the homing tag worked," Tony said. "It must have been damaged when he landed. The tracker found the tag at the first point in space and time that it could."

Clint stared at him, and okay, he hated time travel, he really hated the tesseract, and he really, really hated that they were making this insane situation seem plausible.

Tony, damn him, read his expression and smirked. "Admit it. It's making sense."

"He died 70 years ago! None of this makes sense!"

"No, as crazy as this situation is, most of it actually does make sense," Tony said. "The only thing that doesn't is how Bucky survived." He glanced at Bucky. "No offense, but you had to be falling at terminal velocity. The fall onto my floor should have killed you just as dead as landing on that mountain would have."

"Oh, sure, time travel is fine, but you're going to quibble over gravity," Clint said.

"We have an explanation for the time travel," Tony said, annoyed. "We don't have an explanation for gravity not working like it should."

"The portal must have had some gravitational affect," Bruce said.

"The one I went through didn't."

"We can't be sure of that," Bruce said. "Your suit wasn't set up to take all the readings we'd need and since you were a little distracted on the trip out and unconscious for the trip back, we can't rely on your recollections, either." Tony just rolled his eyes at what was apparently, an argument he'd already heard. Bruce continued. "Besides, the one you went through connected to outer space, was a lot bigger, was stable, and used a lot more power. Any one of those things, a combination of those things, or something we don't know about could account for a difference in the way the two portals worked." He smiled bitterly. "Not that there's any way we can figure it out, because I really doubt Thor is going let us borrow the tesseract to run some tests anytime soon."

"Which is a good thing!" Clint exclaimed, completely shocked because Bruce seriously wanted to experiment on the tesseract? "Do you not remember what happened last time?"

"Of course I do, but we're talking about time travel!" Bruce exclaimed. "Clint, seriously, this is- Tony and I could invent time travel! Not just time travel, either. Transporters. Being able to create a portal between any two points in space - do you understand what that would mean? Near-instantaneous travel to any point on the globe- the difficulties of getting medical and food supplies to isolated areas would disappear overnight!" Clint tossed an alarmed glance at Tony, because Bruce was getting really worked up and that was usually not a good thing. "And space travel, my god... a manned mission to Mars or even beyond that would be so simple! Do you have any idea-"

"Bruce," Tony said, stepping right in front of him, his hands up but not touching Bruce. "Hey, come on, take a breath. No need for the other guy to make an appearance." Bruce gave him a look, but did take a deep breath. "That's it. Now, I know how you feel, but just keep reminding yourself what a bitch it is when the bad guys get their hands on the tesseract. I sure don't want to deal with that again. Do you?"

"No," Bruce said. "It's just- Tony, we could have changed the world."

"Eh, we're still going to change the world," Tony said dismissively. "Sure, there's a lot of cool stuff we can't do without the tesseract, but there's still a lot of cool stuff we can do. Arc reactors, medical equipment, you name it."

"We can't even figure out a sensor array," Bruce grumbled, evidently determined to sulk for a while longer.

Tony rolled his eyes. "You know as well as I do that we have that figured out and we're just missing something small and stupid," he said. Tony blinked. "In fact..." He grabbed Bruce's arm and dragged him over to the array of holographic monitors. Tony pulled up some screens. "What about this?"

After a second, Bruce's face lit up. "That might work." He made some changes, and then he and Tony were spouting science jargon that Clint couldn't begin to follow.

Clint just stared at them for a few seconds, because really, these two were completely fucking insane. He debated whether he should interrupt them, because damn it, he hadn't been done yelling at them, and also, the last thing they needed right now was another surprise. "Hey, JARVIS?" Clint said softly. Tony and Bruce were absorbed in their numbers and didn't hear him.

JARVIS responded just as softly. "Yes, sir?"

"What are the chances that what they're doing now is going to explode something or, you know, pull anyone else through a space-time portal?"

"As they are currently only working with computer models, Agent Barton, I can safely say that the chances of either of those situations happening are nil."

All right, then. Clint decided to leave them to it. It was much easier to resist the urge to shoot them when they were ignoring him. Clint made his way over to the imposter (who was probably not an imposter but hell if he would admit that until Steve confirmed it) and leaned against the wall.

"I'm not getting untied until Steve gets here, am I?" Barnes asked.

"Nope," Clint said.

"Okay," Barnes asked. He watched Tony and Bruce work for a minute. "So. They always like this?"

"Pretty much."

Barnes smirked, he actually fucking smirked like that was good news. "Well, at least the future won't be boring," he said. Clint just stared at him. "What?"

"I really hope you are Barnes, so that next time these two accidentally bring someone 70 years into the future I can make you deal with it."

"Sure, no problem," Barnes said, still smirking. "I mean, there's a good chance I'll know whoever it is so it'd probably be for the best."

Clint reminded himself that he really couldn't shoot anyone before Natasha got here with Steve. And afterwards... well, there were plenty of spots he could hit that wouldn't be lethal or all that damaging, but would be very, very painful. He smirked, and Barnes could read his expression just fine.

"Okay... I'm going to shut up now," Barnes said.

"Good idea."


	3. Chapter 3

Natasha pulled into the driveway of Stark's mansion and shut off the car, but hesitated before getting out. She hadn't told him yet, but now that they were here...

Steve had his door open before he realized she wasn't moving. "Natasha? Shouldn't we go in, you know, so we can see what they did before they fix it and pretend it never happened?" he asked, smiling slightly.

Steve was under the assumption that something embarrassing had happened to Tony and/or Bruce. When she had showed up at the state park and interrupted Steve's camping trip, all she had told him was that there had been a mishap; that Tony and Bruce were fine but needed team supervision to resolve the situation. When he had assumed it was something harmless and embarrassing, she had gone with that, because she knew telling Steve that they needed him to determine if the man who landed in Tony's basement was really Steve's childhood best friend was a horrible idea.

But now, they were at Tony's house, and Clint had texted her that while Tony and Bruce were insane and that Clint still wanted to shoot all three of them, the man almost certainly was Bucky Barnes. How could she let Steve walk into the house without any type of warning?

On the other hand, if she didn't tell him, she would have help dealing with Steve's reaction. She was hoping Steve would just be shocked, but if his reaction was anger, then she could point him at the two people responsible for this situation.

Well, she could point him at Tony. They didn't need to deal with the Hulk on top of everything else today.

"Clint did say they were all right, didn't he?" Steve asked, frowning at her.

"Yes, he did. They're fine," she said. "Shall we?" She climbed out of the car and led the way into the house, but let Steve descend the steps to the garage first.

JARVIS let them through the door and she surveyed the room as they walked in. Tony and Bruce were by one of the tables, and Clint was leaning against a wall near Barnes, who was tied to a chair.

Steve went completely still when he saw Barnes. "What the hell is this?" he asked, his voice low and tight.

That... was a lot of anger. So much so that she hesitated to point him at Tony, because with Steve this angry, he might actually punch someone if the explanation wasn't handled delicately. And delicacy was not something Tony was known for.

There was dead silence for a few seconds, then Barnes set his shoulders and Natasha knew he was going to explain this and take the brunt of Steve's anger.

"We accidentally pulled your friend into the future," Tony said.

Unless Tony beat him to it, that was. Natasha hoped Tony knew what he was doing.

Steve whirled to face Tony. "You think this is funny, Stark?" Steve stalked over to Tony. Bruce moved away but Tony held his ground, even when Steve grabbed Tony's shirt with his fists and shoved him against the table. Tony stayed very still, only waving his hand to motion to the rest of them to stay back. "You think this is some sort of joke? Is that what this is? A prank?"

"Would I do that, Steve?" Tony asked, keeping his voice carefully neutral. "As much as I like messing with you, would I make a joke of this?"

Natasha couldn't see Steve's face, but while Steve was still tense and didn't let go of Tony, he also didn't say anything else.

"Steve," Bruce said, drawing Steve's attention. When Steve looked over, Bruce gestured to a metal box that she assumed was the tracking device. "Do you recognize this?" Steve shook his head, and he had turned enough now so that Natasha could see his face, and oh, Steve looked completely lost. "Howard invented it," Bruce said. "It's a tracking device."

Steve remembered, then. "He gave me a tag to hold onto, but I-" he stopped, cutting himself off.

"You gave it to Bucky," Tony finished, and Steve looked back at Tony. "But you never told Dad. He thought you had it. So when you went down in the ice, he tried to use this to look for you. When it didn't work, he tried to use the tesseract to make it work." Even from behind, she could see Steve's surprise at that.

"We pieced together what happened, Steve, and we won't go into all the details right now, but we're almost positive this is really your friend," Bruce said. "We just need you to ask him a few questions to confirm it."

Steve didn't respond, didn't even move. After a moment, Barnes spoke. "When you found me strapped to that table, you said you thought I was dead. I said I thought you were smaller."

It took her a moment, then she realized Barnes was talking about when Steve rescued Barnes and the other prisoners from the Hydra camp. It had been the first time he had seen Steve post-serum.

"You kept trying to enlist with different addresses," Barnes said. "Day before I shipped out, you said you were from Paramus, of all places. You remember, when I found you in that alley by the movie theater picking a fight with someone twice your size. Again."

Steve finally let go of Tony and turned to face Barnes. Steve stared at him intently, a look that was hopeful but still fearful on his face. Barnes continued. "We went to the expo that night. I got us both dates, too, not that you appreciated that."

"What were their names?" Steve asked quietly.

"Helen and Judy," Bucky said. "Though I'm surprised you remember. You ditched us to try and enlist again after Howard's flying car didn't get off the ground." He smirked. "Not sure I ever thanked you for that, by the way."

Tony made a sound of amusement which - to his credit - he quickly muffled, and everyone ignored him. Natasha was fairly certain Steve hadn't even heard Tony. Steve's expression had lightened a bit. He was starting to believe.

"Where did we eat Sunday dinner?" Steve asked.

"Miss Conner's place," Bucky said. "Sometimes more than just Sunday, too. That woman was always trying to feed you. Made the best damn potato soup you've ever tasted, but couldn't bake a pie to save her life."

Steve smiled faintly at that, but there was still fear in his eyes. He was still afraid to believe this was his friend. "What happened the Christmas we were fifteen?" he asked.

Bucky looked at him for a moment, then smirked. "I could tell you that, or I could tell you a story I know damned well you never told another soul," he said. "Rita Miller."

Steve's eyes widened almost comically. Barnes opened his mouth to continue, a look of glee on his face, and Steve jumped forward. "Shit, no, stop! It's him, let him loose."

Natasha started to move towards Bucky. "Natasha, now, wait a second," Tony said, grinning. "We can't let him loose yet. He has to finish the story." He looked at Barnes. "You understand. We have to be sure."

"Oh, absolutely," Barnes said, and if he and Tony had been like this the whole time, Natasha could understand why Clint wanted to shoot them. She came up behind Barnes' chair, but he didn't spare her a glance while he continued. "See, Rita was-"

"Jesus Christ, Bucky, shut up!" Steve exclaimed. He tried to give Tony a warning look but it just came across as pleading. "Don't." Amazingly enough, Tony did keep his mouth shut.

Natasha just smiled as she sliced through the ties around Barnes' wrists with a knife from her boot. "You are going to make life interesting," she said softly, just loud enough for Barnes to hear. He glanced at her briefly, answering her with a smirk.

Barnes got to his feet, rubbing his wrists. Steve had frozen, looking again like he was afraid to believe that this was real. Barnes smiled at him for a second, then stepped forward and pulled Steve into a tight hug. All the tension went out of Steve and he hugged his friend back so tightly Natasha worried Steve might have forgotten his strength - but then again, Barnes wasn't complaining.

Natasha went back to Clint and leaned against the wall next to him. She smiled softly as she watched the reunion. "This is nice," she said quietly.

"Yeah," Clint agreed. "So nice I almost don't want to shoot them anymore."

"You can't shoot them," she said, even though she could tell he was just joking now.

"Strictly non-lethal," Clint said lightly. "Come on, Tasha, Barnes was-"

"If you shoot Steve's friend, non-lethal or not, Steve will kill you," Natasha said.

"Okay, but Bruce and Tony-"

"Bruce would Hulk out," she said. "No."

Clint looked at her. "You can't have an objection to me shooting Tony."

Natasha just smirked. "I wouldn't. Pepper would."

"Fine, just spoil all my fun," Clint said, not quite able to hide his smile. "We can at least make Tony and Bruce explain all this to Fury, right?"

"Oh, absolutely," Natasha said.

Across the lab, Bruce and Tony were having their own whispered conversation as they smiled at the scene. Tony was obviously happy for Steve, but also smirking in a way that Natasha knew meant he was gearing up to tease Steve a bit. Though at least Tony waited until Barnes and Steve stepped apart and acknowledged the rest of them again.

"Okay," Tony said. "Now that everyone's reunited, I have a few things to say."

"Of course you do," Steve muttered, bracing himself.

"First, I will find out who Rita Miller is," Tony said. "Just giving you fair warning, though I'm sure you already knew I wasn't going to let that one go."

"It's a good story. You'll like it," Barnes said. Steve tried to glare at Barnes, but he was still far too relieved and happy to have his friend back to pull it off.

"I'm sure I will," Tony said. "Second, Barnes, a question. Exactly how often did you use Steve to land yourself threesomes?"

Barnes grinned, but Steve beat him to answering. "Tony!" Steve exclaimed, flushing slightly.

"Oh my god, Rogers, quit it with the embarrassed virginal act already," Tony said, exasperated. "Your best friend has had at least one threesome, you traveled around the country on a USO tour with a good number of attractive young women, and you have had sex. Seriously, stop it."

Steve just flushed an even deeper shade of red at all that, and Natasha probably should intervene but this was far too amusing to stop.

"How do they know you've had sex?" Bucky asked. "Do they have alcohol that can get you drunk, now?"

"Bucky," Steve pleaded.

"No, I want to know. You didn't even tell me. I had to hear it from Howard, and he only knew because he caught you sneaking out of Peggy's room."

"What a coincidence," Bruce said, and he was at least trying to hide his amusement at Steve's embarrassment. "Howard's how we found out, too."

Bucky blinked, then looked at Tony. "Howard told you?" he asked. Tony nodded, and Bucky paused for a moment. "How the hell did that come up in conversation?"

"It didn't. Not directly," Tony said, amused. "But when I was four, Howard - who was a little drunk - introduced me to a very lovely woman and told me that she knew Captain America in the biblical sense."

Bucky's eyes widened and he let out a short laugh. "He said that? And Peggy let him live?"

"Oh, she very nearly killed him," Tony said. "I think only the fact that I was, you know, four and had no idea what was going on saved him. Of course, it made an impression, and I eventually figured out what he actually meant."

"Which you took great pleasure in telling everyone about the first chance you got," Steve muttered.

"Like I was going to pass up that opportunity," Tony said, giving Steve a once-over. "Jesus, you are still beet red. All right, I believe you're not faking, but we need to find a way to cure you of this because it is just sad."

"Not sure we can," Bucky answered. "Really, if the ribbing the Commandos put him through about traveling with the USO dames didn't, nothing will. Though that one time with the hookers? He was fine. Go figure."

Natasha had a hard time suppressing her laughter as Tony's jaw dropped and Steve closed his eyes and turned an even brighter shade of red. Beside her, Clint didn't bother suppressing anything and laughed out loud.

"Hookers?" Clint repeated. "Oh, my god, did Captain America pay for it?"

Bruce started snickering, attempting to muffle the sound behind a hand.

"Of course not," Steve said. "I only talked to them, it was for a mission, and-" he cut himself off as it was apparent no one was really listening. He looked at Bucky. "Damn it, Bucky, you can't say that kind of stuff around these guys."

"No, no, please, continue saying that kind of stuff," Tony said, eyes dancing with amusement. "In fact, I will pay you to say it. You will be set for life. All you have to do is tell me embarrassing stories about Steve."

"Deal," Barnes said. At Steve's look, he just shrugged. "Hey, a guy's gotta eat."

"Oh, Steve, you're doomed," Bruce said, chuckling.

"Completely doomed," Natasha agreed.

Steve sighed. "It'd be nice if you guys could at least look a little less thrilled about it."

"But it's going to be so much fun to watch," Clint said, grinning.

Natasha finally took pity on Steve and changed the subject. "What will also be fun to watch is Bruce and Tony explaining all this to Fury."

"Not it," Bruce said quickly. Tony scowled at him. "I explained this to Clint and Natasha. It's your turn."

"Oh, come on, guys, do you really want me explaining this to Fury?" Tony asked.

"Yes," Natasha said.

"Absolutely," Clint said.

Steve nodded, and even Barnes spoke up. "I don't even know Fury and I still want to see this," he said, earning a smile from Steve and just a roll of the eyes from Tony.

Tony switched tacks. "Do we have to call Fury? I mean, chances are he already knows what happened. I'm sure someone was listening in on the phone call earlier."

"They weren't," Bruce said. "SHIELD's still trying to crack that encryption you put on the phones."

Tony sighed. "Right. Damn it, the one time I actually want them to be competent..." he trailed off, his gaze locked on a stack of boxes, then he slowly grinned. "Huh."

Natasha did not like that grin. "What?" she asked warily.

"Nothing. I just figured out why this is all Fury's fault."

She blinked at him, then looked at Clint, who was as confused as she was. Really, Bruce was the only one didn't look completely lost. "Oh," Bruce said. "So that's where...?" he asked, gesturing to the boxes.

"Yep," Tony said, moving to the desk to video-call Fury.

"That's perfect," Bruce said, grinning. "Why didn't you think of this earlier?"

"Oh, forgive me for being a little distracted by the guy falling out of a time portal onto my garage floor," Tony said, rolling his eyes.

Steve looked at her and Clint. "What are they talking about?"

"I have no idea," Natasha said.

"Are we sure we still want to let Tony explain this to Fury?" Steve asked.

"Better him than us," Clint said.

Fury's face appeared on a monitor as he answered the phone, cutting off further discussion. "Stark," Fury said. "I suppose you're calling to explain why Barton, Romanoff, and Rogers all high-tailed it over to your house this afternoon?"

"Oh, hey, the techs got GPS tracking on their phones back," Tony said with a false brightness. "That's not too bad."

Fury narrowed his eyes. "We tracked their cars. There's been no progress on the phones and you know that. Now, stop trying to change the subject and tell me what you and Banner managed to destroy."

Tony just grinned. "Oh, inept SHIELD scientists are more on topic than you might think," he said. "Do you remember those boxes you sent me to sort through? The ones you said had already been picked over by SHIELD and held nothing of interest?"

And, okay, now Natasha saw where Tony was going with this, and she smiled. She leaned closer to Clint, who had also figured it out. "I have to hand it to Tony. I think he's actually going to talk his way out of this one," she murmured as Tony started explaining the situation.

Clint smirked. "Maybe with Fury. I doubt the other eggheads at SHIELD will appreciate it all that much."

"Like they'll be able to do anything about it," Natasha said softly. "Besides, if they didn't want the blame they should have found the time travel device."

And then Tony reached the parts of the explanation where he told Fury about the tesseract portal and the accidental time travel, and Natasha settled back to enjoy the rare pleasure of seeing Director Fury completely thrown for a loop.


End file.
